Pakse

So after no sleep the night before, we were looking forward to a big comfy bus to sleep in for 6 hours - this DID NOT happen. We bought our VIP tickets from Tha Khet to Pakse but what we got was a rickety old local bus with leather seats complete with holes and no air con. The journey probably should have only taken 4-5 hours but the driver (and his 3 mates) must have stopped on the side of the road every 10mins - literally, no joke! They stopped for a smoke, a walk, a chat, a spitting contest, to pick a local up, to smoke, to check out a new house being built, to smoke, to chat, to disappear then reappear with a monk, to smoke, to let more old ladies and kids on to sell stuff aaaaand so on - it was never ending and the absolute epitomy of Laos slow time. When we eventually arrived at Pakse bus station, there was only one tuk tuk to bring people into town 4km away (the Laos people know how to scam the tourists, that's for sure) 13 Europeans all needing to get into town and only one tuk tuk driver with the solution - initially he wanted 20,000kip per person, which we flat refused so after a bit of tooing and froing Matt got him down to 15,000 but not to let the others know lol. Anyway we all piled on and sped down the road at about 5miles an hour until we off loaded a few people and their bags and then continued to our accommodation! There were 7 of us looking at the same guesthouse but luckily Matt legged it in first and secured the last double room for us - thank god, a bed to sleep in!

We dropped our bags and took a well needed shower before going to scope the town out - there wasn't much to see in fairness, but it's only a small place and caters for treks and caving etc, so we grabbed some food and headed back to the guesthouse to watch Rise of the Planet of the Apes and an early night before we had to get up the next morning (I also ran out of all clean clothes, honestly, so had to wash a knickers and top for the next day letting them dry on my trusty washing line overnight - thanks Hazel :)) for our 8am mini bus to the 4000 Islands in the very south of Laos - now this we cannot wait for….

S&M